Pakistan floods worse than 2004 tsunami: UN

The United Nations estimates 1,600 people have died in Pakistan's floods.

Reuters

The United Nations said the massive floods in Pakistan had affected 13.8 million people and eclipsed the scale of the devastating 2004 tsunami, as anger mounted among survivors.

The Pakistani government and UN officials have appealed for more urgent relief efforts to cope with the worst floods in more than 80 years, with President Asif Ali Zardari due to return home after a heavily criticised European tour.

The entire north-western Swat valley, where Pakistan fought a major campaign to flush out Taliban insurgents last year, was cut off at the weekend as were parts of the country's breadbasket in Punjab and Sindh.

"This disaster is worse than the tsunami, the 2005 Pakistan earthquake and the Haiti earthquake," Maurizio Giuliano, a spokesman for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), said.

He said the 13.8 million affected outstripped the more than 3 million hit by the 2005 earthquake, 5 million in the tsunami and the 3 million affected by the Haiti earthquake.

The United Nations estimates 1,600 people have died in Pakistan's floods. About 220,000 were killed by the December 26, 2004 tsunami in Southeast Asia.

"Millions of people have suffered and still there is more rain and further losses are feared. I appeal to the world to help us," prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani told reporters.

Foreign donors including the United States have pledged tens of millions of dollars in aid but, on the ground, Islamic charities with suspected extremist links have been far more visible in the relief effort than the government.

Pakistan's meteorological office forecast only scattered rain in the next 24 hours and said the intensity of monsoon showers was lessening.

But with floods sweeping south, thousands of people are fleeing into cities to seek safety as heavy rains continued to lash the province of Sindh and water levels rose further in the swollen Indus river.

Mr Zardari has spent August in France and Britain, courting massive criticism from the political opposition and intelligentsia for not returning at a time of national disaster. One protester threw a shoe at him in England.

The United Nations estimated that up to 500,000 people are homeless and 1.4 million acres of agricultural land destroyed in central Punjab province, but said damage was worst in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

OCHA spokesman Mr Giuliano said that even donkeys were being used to access parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa inaccessible by other means and warned that the risk of water-borne diseases persisted.

Authorities in the Punjab district of Muzaffargarh issued a red alert and ordered people to evacuate as water entered the city from breaches in canals.

"The situation is very serious. We are totally helpless. That's why we asked people to move to a safer place," local official Farasat Iqbal told AFP.

An overloaded army boat evacuating people in the Punjab town of Jampur capsized Sunday and 30 people are missing, said a local official.

At least 14 people, including three children, were killed as flash floods destroyed homes in the the northwestern Hangu district. In the lawless Khyber district on the Afghan border, 150 houses were destroyed in floods.